Dust-Up Over Conflict of Interest

Saying that he wanted to “get all of this folderal behind us,” Goleta Water District board president Jack Cunningham convened a hastily called special meeting to address conflict-of-interest accusations against the board’s legal counsel, attorney Chip Wullbrandt.

Nine days earlier, on December 11, while still defending Wullbrandt’s good name, the five boardmembers nonetheless agreed to hire outside counsel to administer a on the topic of conflict of interest. At the December 20 meeting, an ad hoc committee consisting of Cunningham and fellow boardmember Harry De Witt put forward candidates to conduct the tutorial in hopes that the full board would vote to select one of them. It did not, because members of the public objected that the candidates were not experts on the subject of legal ethics.

“I made a unilaterial decision,” said Cunningham, “that we don’t want to rush into this. We want to make sure that the person we finally hire will be acceptable to the public. I’m controlling myself,” he added, joking, “but you can’t tell, because I’m Irish.”